Ultrasound imaging has provided useful information about the interior characteristics of an object or subject under examination. A US scanner generally includes a probe with a transducer array that is configured to transmit an ultrasound signal into the object or subject under examination. As the signal traverses the object or subject under examination, portions of the signal are attenuated, scattered, and/or reflected off structure and/or boundaries in the interior of the object or subject, with some of the reflections traversing back towards the transducer array. The later reflections are referred to as echoes and are detected by the transducer array. In B-mode imaging, the echoes correspond to an axial slice through the object or subject and are processed to generate scanlines, which are used to generate a scanplane, or two dimensional image of the slice, which can be displayed via a monitor. B-mode scanplanes can be combined with color flow, Doppler flow, and/or other information.
Generally, there are two types of ultrasound imaging probes—flexible and rigid. Flexible ultrasound probes include an articulating portion that can be controllably articulated to move an end of the probe with a transducer array through an angle of up to ninety (90) degrees in one to four planes. FIGS. 1A and 1B show an example of a flexible probe 100; namely, a laparoscopic transducer type 8666, which is a product of BK-Medical ApS, a company of Herlev, Denmark, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Analogic Corporation, a company of MA, USA. As shown in FIG. 1A, the probe 100 is configured to articulate between a zero position 102 and an up position 104 and a down position 106. As shown in FIG. 1B, the probe 100 is configured to articulate between the zero position 102 and a left position 108 and a right position 110. In contrast, rigid probes are not configured to articulate as such and remain in a single position. Rigid probes, in addition to imaging, can also be used to push, lift, displace and/otherwise maneuver tissue of interest.
Generally, flexible ultrasound probes provide much better access, relative to rigid ultrasound probes, to organs or other tissue of interest for imaging as they are flexible and can be more easily maneuvered in an internal cavity of a patient. Unfortunately, with flexible ultrasound probes, it may not be possible to use the probe to also push, lift, displace and/otherwise maneuver tissue of interest as the probe may inadvertanble flex while trying to do so, moving the tissue in a manner other than the indended manner and/or not moving the tissue at all.